??It's been three years since The Strokes brought out Comedown Machine, an album that I don't remember having much impact at the time, I've even met fans who didn't know they'd released it! 2011's Angles was more up my street, and fared better in the charts, although arguably there's more filler than killer on that collection too. After headlining last years Primavera festival in Barcelona and playing a huge concert in London's Hyde Park, we're not too surprised to hear some new material from the group, but this small release was launched so inconspicuously we almost missed it. Future Present Past is the band’s first EP release since their début The Modern Age dropped in 2001, causing the major label bidding war that launched the band into the musical stratosphere. This trio of new tracks forms a sort of minimalist career retrospective, looking to their past, where they ended up and, hopefully pointing to where they're headed.

??'Drag Queen' plods along with a steady 80s drum beat, a bass guitar with a horrendous amount of filthy distortion throbbing away and a shiny clean guitar masquerading as a glassy synth. The effect is like a late 70s/early 80s bit of future-synth, from a group like Kraftwerk or producer Giorgio Moroder, it could be the optimistic sound of tomorrow, except it's so dirty it has become dystopian, especially through Casablancas’ vocal: muggy, messed up and at times deliberately machine-like. It sounds like he's recorded several takes and treated each differently. At times, one of these voices interrupts the other, at others, strange effects are applied to pitch him up. The lyrics are hard to make out through the fug, but thankfully the band have released a lyrics video, with a complimentary retroscoping-style animation that gives us a chance to decipher the distorted drawl. At times Casablancas is seriously downbeat, with his frightening vision of a future city where “they try to sell the water/try to sell the air/try to sell your daughter/try to sell her hair”. At other times he's downright hilarious: “coast to coast/LA to Chicago/I don't know geography all that well”.

??The next track 'OBLIVIUS', would have sat nicely on 2011's Angles album with its elaborate melodic, harmonised guitar lines. It has a great big chorus, where Casablancas’ voice soars asking 'what side are you standing on?' as the guitars simplify, growing broader and more densely distorted. After a screeching guitar solo, things breakdown to a faux-classical section of guitar playing that wouldn't have sounded out of place on Daft Punk's Discovery, backed by a soft, distant falsetto vocal. Interestingly, the EP closes with a remix of 'OBLIVIUS' from the band's drummer Fab Moretti, and it's not what I was expecting at all. Rather than taking the source material and re-imagining the track it sounds almost like Moretti has literally just made another mix from the desk. He puts a lot more emphasis on the vocal, bringing it to the fore and giving it clarity, whilst also emphasising, and embellishing the song with more synth parts, replacing verse guitars. ??

If we're to take the Future Present Past title as instructional then the third track 'Threat Of Joy' must represent The Strokes' past – and it certainly has a production sound that ties it more closely to their earliest work. It's interesting to note that this is the first EP the band have released since their debut The Modern Age 15 years ago and this wouldn't have sounded too out of place alongside 'Last Nite' and 'The Modern Age', although this comes across as more of a ballad. There's a clarity and cleanness to the guitars and drums that contrasts with Casablancas’ distinctive slurred vocals in much the same way they did way back in the early days. It's unreasonably tight, with an easy-going sound that flies by despite its mid-tempo leanings, and when a smooth arpeggio guitar comes in in the final third it sounds great. The best moment to my ears though is the super-mellow coda the song plays out on, it's a bit of magic that stands out to me in the same way the walking bass-line does on the title track from their debut album 'Is This It' – a bit of unexpected flair when everything around it is played straight.

??It would be great if 'Drag Queen' turns out to be the first signs of some moody futurist Strokes album we'll be getting later in the year, but I wouldn't hold your breath. In a recent interview with Zane Lowe on his Beats 1 show Casablancas talked about making music for the internet age and preferring to work on EP releases rather than albums. It does kind of make sense, this is their most consistent release in a long time, three tracks that, whilst being wildly different in approach from each other, are all memorable and of the highest quality. Nowadays, with the shrinking attention spans of the smart-phone generation it could be the case that regular, bite-size releases are the way to capture hearts and imaginations without demanding too much from an audience. Personally, I'm not quite ready to ring the death knell on the classic album format. We'd do well to note that future trends are as likely to progress towards new ground as they are to regress relishing golden eras, just look at the continuing vinyl renaissance we're enjoying. I for one am hoping this stealthy EP simply represents the band keeping their oar in while they complete work on some dark magnum opus. ??
Adam Kidd

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